JAMMU, Aug 31 (2002): Some 30,000 Indian paramilitary forces and police commandos have arrived in Kashmir to provide security for the state elections starting next month, police said Saturday. Already 10,000 police officials are providing security to certain "protected persons" including political leaders, bureaucrats, journalists and businessmen, a state police spokesman said. The new guards will give security to candidates, political leaders and voters. The elections are taking place in four phases starting...

SRINAGAR, Aug 31 (2002): An influential separatist group two of whose leaders have left the party to fight upcoming state polls in Kashmir was plunged into crisis Saturday. Two members of the Peoples Conference (PC) -- Ghulam Mohiudin Sofi and Abdul Rashid Mirchal -- resigned from the party on Thursday in a surprise move and filed election papers as independent candidates in the northern Kupwara district. Virtually all separatists have decided to boycott the election, because they say it is not a solution to the...

WASHINGTON, Aug 31 (2002): The United States has said it retains confidence in Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's ability to curb infiltration of Islamic militants into Indian-controlled Kashmir, despite new violence in the divided region. "Well, we do believe that President Musharraf is a man of his word and we're going to treat him as such and treat his word with all the care which it deserves," said US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, appearing late Friday on PBS's "News Hour with Jim Lehrer"...

SRINAGAR, Aug 31 (2002): The chief minister of Indian Kashmir Farooq Abdullah will not stand in upcoming polls in the state, instead nominating his son to contest them from his constituency, party officials said Saturday. Abdullah's son Omar, who is India's junior foreign minister, was Friday nominated by Kashmir's ruling National Conference (NC) party as their candidate for the Gandherbal constituency in Srinagar, the state's summer capital. Gandherbal has elected Farooq Abdullah to the state legislature three times...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002):Troops shot dead 13 Muslim militants, nine of them along Pakistan's borders, while an Indian soldier died as the two rival armies traded fire, an army spokesman said Friday. The fighting also led to the killings of two civilians and two political activists from Kashmir's ruling National Conference party in separate overnight clashes elsewhere in the state, the police said. Nine of the 13 militants killed where shot dead just after they sneaked from Pakistan into Indian Kashmir's northern...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002): Fitr-ul-Hassan, a 16-year-old Kashmiri student, is not eligible to vote, but he is waiting in a government office in Kashmir to pick up an election identity card. He doesn't have a choice. Last week, Hassan was detained by police after he failed to produce an election identity card which is needed to vote for the polls starting in the Himalayan region next month. "They (police) put me in the lockup and tore my other ID card. My cousin also faced the same kind of problem. I have paid some...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002):Troops shot dead nine Islamic militants along the de facto border dividing Kashmir between nuclear-rivals India and Pakistan, while an Indian soldier died as the two armies exchanged fire, an army spokesman said Friday. He said the nine militants were killed in northern Kupwara district. "The army has foiled yet another infiltration attempt by militants near the Line of Control (LoC) by killing nine infiltrators," the army spokesman said in Srinagar, Indian- administered Kashmir's summer...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002):Troops shot dead 13 Muslim militants, nine of them along Pakistan's borders, while an Indian soldier died as the two rival armies traded fire, an army spokesman said Friday. The fighting also led to the killings of two civilians and two political activists from Kashmir's ruling National Conference party in separate overnight clashes elsewhere in the state, the police said. Nine of the 13 militants killed where shot dead just after they sneaked from Pakistan into Indian Kashmir's northern...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002): Fitr-ul-Hassan, a 16-year-old Kashmiri student, is not eligible to vote, but he is waiting in a government office in Kashmir to pick up an election identity card. He doesn't have a choice. Last week, Hassan was detained by police after he failed to produce an election identity card which is needed to vote for the polls starting in the Himalayan region next month. "They (police) put me in the lockup and tore my other ID card. My cousin also faced the same kind of problem. I have paid some...

SRINAGAR, Aug 30 (2002):Troops shot dead nine Islamic militants along the de facto border dividing Kashmir between nuclear-rivals India and Pakistan, while an Indian soldier died as the two armies exchanged fire, an army spokesman said Friday. He said the nine militants were killed in northern Kupwara district. "The army has foiled yet another infiltration attempt by militants near the Line of Control (LoC) by killing nine infiltrators," the army spokesman said in Srinagar, Indian- administered Kashmir's summer...